Picking Up Their Pieces
by waywardturtles
Summary: Mary was dead. And Parker had to live with it. After his little sister dies at the hands of a vamp and his father, the notorious Sam Winchester, disowns him, Parker is left alone in the world, living numbly. His father has become madly intent on wiping out the vampire race. His Uncles have vanished. And what can he do but keep living, and pick up their pieces as he goes?


**Picking Up Their Pieces**

It was dark –eyes closed or eyes open– it was the same: black. It was stifling.

Parker slid his hands along the wall, looking for something to grab onto to pull himself up off the floor. However, the walls were altogether smooth, damp, slimy, and useless, and he struggled to his feet, unaided.

His back burned with the strain, and subconsciously, he wondered how long he had been out. His legs tingled and his heart ached every time it thudded against his ribs.

It was cold, and black, and silent, except for his ragged breathing and the sound of something dripping onto the floor some way away.

_Drip, drip, drip._

It sounded like water… but Parker knew it wasn't. In this business, it never was. He sighed, trying to play it off like he wasn't scared, even though he was terrified – and alone.

Jesus. He was alone. Where was Amy? And Maddie?

His chest tightened and his features grew rigid. He exhaled a soft, steamy breath into the frigid darkness and fingered the hilt of the blade sticking out of one boot. He slipped the knife from its nest in his boot and let its familiar weight in his hand lull his mind. He blinked slowly and set on ahead at a wary pace.

For a long time he could see nothing, and he stumbled along, clutching at the still-smooth wall with numb fingers. Finally, he had staggered into a part of the cave set permanently into a state of twilight. His eyes adjusted to the half light, and a grim smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. He turned.

His eyes became hollow and his mouth opened in a silent wail.

Mary Madeline Winchester, his baby sister, leaned propped up against the cave wall. Her dark, frizzy black hair was strewn wildly across her pale shoulders. Her pastel lips, like dry rose petals, were parted, just barely, and from the corner of her mouth dripped a rivulet of blood.

Her perfect blue empty and half lidded. Her pale neck was streaked with angry red. And finally, Parker's own blue eyes fell upon the cause of her death.

A tear slid silently down his face, cutting through the layer of dust on his face.

Instead of dying at the hands of a blood-crazy vampire, she had chosen her own fate. He saw a jagged piece of rock clutched loosely in one curled, dead hand. She'd taken her own life. Here, of all places, in this damnable, dank cavern, she had died. He watched the blood dripping from her wrist, realizing that that was the noise he'd heard. It was already congealing in the cold air.

Mary Madeline Winchester, his baby sister, was dead.

And then it hit him like a bus: this was big, and permanent, and _real._ He wouldn't ever get to see her, her face hidden by a book and her unruly hair bushing out like some sort of exotic bird. He wouldn't ever get to see her, foot tapping, waiting impatiently for her Ramen noodles to finish cooking, or see her slurping them up happily. He wouldn't get to see her shyly talking to the boy she liked at school – stumbling over her words, laughing nervously. He would never get to see her again, at all, ever. She was gone. He was never getting her back.

And that was when the screaming started.

It was Amy.

Parker's throat constricted and he dove into the deeper bowels of the cave, his insides twisting as he realized: he was leaving Maddie behind. Again.

He charged ahead, tears stinging his eyes and blurring his vision. He called out for Amy, but his voice only echoed back at him, throwing his loss back in his face.

Then he saw them. Stooping over Amy's frighteningly still body was a vamp, its eyes closed and its fangs sunk into her paling neck. Parker threw his knife, barely lining up the shot. His anger had granted him bloodlust and accuracy. The blade thudded cleanly through the centre of the vamp's neck and pinned him against one of the cave walls. He writhed, the blood seeping thickly from his neck already beginning to congeal. Parker's eyes were colder than the mountain water dripping softly from the stalactites. He drew his machete and cut of its head.

He watched the vamp's head rolling, leaving a trail of dark blood in its wake. He kicked it across the room, and with a thin, guttural cry, he threw his machete through the still heart of the monster.

Amy's head lolled to the side, but her lips, the same pastel as Maddie's, moved, just barely. "Hey bonehead, why'd you just impale a corpse? Thing's a doornail." She yawned, pressing her pale hand against the vivid wounds in her neck.

Amy was the second oldest, but she'd been on more hunting trips with Parker's Dad and Uncle Dean than anyone else. She'd dealt with vamps the most – even been fed on before – and she was fearless. Usually, her voice was like a roll of thunder, low and unafraid. Now, though, it was barely more than a whisper. But her dark green eyes, so much like Uncle Dean's, were sharp and alert. She knew something was wrong as soon as she caught the animalistic look on that twisted Parker's face.

"Where's Maddie?" she said sharply, her gaze trying to meet his. Parker looked away and choked.

Amy was up and stumbling in a heartbeat. She fell, scraping her knee and ripping her jeans, but she kept on, and for the first time, Parker saw it. It darkened her eyes, but other than that, it was impossible to tell that Amy Winchester was afraid.

Parker knew when she found the body. He heard a thin, shrill wailing, and he knew. Even though Amy Winchester – trigger happy, purely intimidating, cold, smooth, sarcastic Amy Winchester – had never made any such noise throughout her entire nightmarish life, Parker had heard it before. On the night that a demon had broken into their house and almost killed Uncle Cas, little Amelia Winchester had screamed just like that.

Just like that.

And then Parker's legs began to move toward the sound and he watched his arms wrap his older sister in a hug. And he held her as she sobbed, but he didn't feel it. He didn't feel any of it, except for the cold, accusing weight of Mary Madeline's dead eyes right between his shoulder blades.


End file.
